Showing form using light and shadows

These two sketches of different still-life set-ups took 20 minutes to produce using charcoal. Both of them focus on showing the form of basic geometrical objects using light and shadows.

The first drawing shows great use of shadows, especially on the cloth and the black background contrasts the arrangement pretty well giving it a pretty good three dimensional feeling. A range of tonal values are shown, which create depth, especially on the drapery near the cone. At first the viewer’s eye falls on the cone and then it is drawn to the black shadow on the cloth in the right. The shadow makes beautiful line that leads the eye to the cube and finally to the cylinder. This forms an implied line that takes a snake like appearance.

It is not a perfect drawing, for the cube’s perspective seems to be wrong and the cylinders form seems to be curved where the light hits the object. The cones top should be more lighted for it doesn’t feel right as the two lighted spaces are disrupted by a bridge of shadow.

The second drawing displays a beautiful example of different tonal values giving excellent form to the geometrical objects. The light falls perfectly on the sphere and drags the viewer’s eye to the dark part reaching the light dot in the back, which points out the direction where the eye should go. Then the eye is drawn by the ray of light that falls on the cone and then it follows the dark arc to the tip of the cone. The cloth near the cone on the right gives a good sense of depth. It is clear that the perspective on the cube that’s hidden underneath the cloth is better than in the first drawing.

It is not perfect by any means for the drawing would have brought better depth if the cloth had more detail in it as it had in the first drawing. Furthermore, the cloth on the left of the cone is completely wrong as it shows no sign of depth whatsoever.